Wal-Mart Offers Health Benefits to U.S. Workers’ Domestic Partners

/1 Comment/in , /by

Photo Credit: Reuters

Photo Credit: Reuters

Wal-Mart Stores Inc said on Tuesday it will offer health insurance benefits to domestic partners of its U.S. employees starting next year, following the lead of other major companies.

The world’s largest retailer, based in Bentonville, Arkansas, also plans to begin to offer vision care to its eligible employees and their dependents, according to information the retailer sent to workers this week.

Wal-Mart is the single biggest U.S. employer outside of the federal government. More than half of its 1.3 million U.S. employees are on its health-care plans. The company said it does not know how many workers would use the new benefits, which also include free hip and knee joint replacements.

Wal-Mart’s extension of health insurance to domestic partners comes after the U.S. Supreme Court in June forced the federal government to recognize same-sex marriages in states where it is legal. The Supreme Court also paved the way for same-sex marriage in California.

“Since we operate in all 50 states, we thought it was important to develop a single definition for all Wal-Mart associates in the U.S.,” spokesman David Tovar said.

Read more from this story HERE.

Missouri Poised to Enact Measure Nullifying Federal Gun Laws

/4 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: Reuters

Photo Credit: Reuters

The Republican-led Missouri Legislature is expected to override Gov. Jay Nixon’s veto of a bill that would expand gun rights and make federal gun regulations unenforceable — even as similar laws in other states designed to buck federal gun rules face legal challenges.

Several of Nixon’s fellow Democrats told The Associated Press that they would vote to override his veto when lawmakers convene in September, even while agreeing with the governor that the bill couldn’t survive a court challenge. Many of them noted that in some parts of Missouri, a “no” vote on gun legislation could be career ending.

The legislation would make it a misdemeanor for federal agents to attempt to enforce any federal gun regulations that “infringe on the people’s right to keep and bear arms.” The same criminal charges would apply to journalists who publish any identifying information about gun owners. The charge would be punishable by up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine.

Nixon said the bill infringes on the U.S. Constitution by giving precedence to state law over federal laws and by limiting the First Amendment rights of media.

The legislation is one of the boldest measures yet in a recent national trend in which states are attempting to nullify federal laws. A recent Associated Press analysis found that about four-fifths of the states have enacted local laws that directly reject or ignore federal laws on gun control, marijuana use, health insurance requirements and identification standards for driver’s licenses. Relatively few of those go so far as to threaten criminal charges against federal authorities.

Read more from this story HERE.

Martin Luther King Jr.’s Niece: King Was Pro-Life (+video)

/2 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: Life News

Photo Credit: Life News

Today is the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington and martin Luther King Jr’s famous “I have a dream speech.” While the pro-abortion giant Planned Parenthood participated in Saturday’s March on Washington, King’s niece says the civil rights leader would have been pro-life on abortion.

Alexis McGill Johnson, Chairman of Planned Parenthood Federation, told rally participants that Planned Parenthood gave King an award.

Read more from this story HERE.

Senator Tim Scott Wasn’t Invited to Event Commemorating MLK March on Washington

/4 Comments/in , /by

Tim Scott Senator Tim Scott, R.-S.C., the only African American serving in the United States Senate, wasn’t invited to the event commemorating the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s march on Washington, though a host of Democratic luminaries spoke on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

“Senator Scott was not invited to speak at the event,” Greg Blair, a spokesman for the South Carolina lawmaker, said in a statement to the Washington Examiner. “The senator believes today is a day to remember the extraordinary accomplishments and sacrifices of Dr. King, Congressman John Lewis, and an entire generation of black leaders. Today’s anniversary should simply serve as an opportunity to reflect upon how their actions moved our country forward in a remarkable way.”

Wouldn’t it have made sense to have the first black president joined by the first black senator from South Carolina, which was a Jim Crow state when the original march on Washington took place?

Read more from this story HERE.

Military Strikes on Syria ‘as Early as Thursday,’ US Officials Say (+video)

/17 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: NBC

Photo Credit: NBC

The U.S. could hit Syria with three days of missile strikes, perhaps beginning Thursday, in an attack meant more to send a message to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad than to topple him or cripple his military, senior U.S. officials told NBC News on Tuesday.

The State Department fed the growing drumbeat around the world for a military response to Syria’s suspected use of chemical weapons against rebels Aug. 21 near Damascus, saying that while the U.S. intelligence community would release a formal assessment within the week, it was already “crystal clear” that Assad’s government was responsible.

Vice President Joe Biden went even further, bluntly telling an American Legion audience in Houston: “Chemical weapons have been used.”

“No one doubts that innocent men, women and children have been the victims of chemical weapons attacks in Syria, and there’s no doubt who’s responsible for this heinous use of chemical weapons in Syria: the Syrian regime,” Biden said.

White House press secretary Jay Carney repeated Tuesday that the White House isn’t considering the deliberate overthrow of Assad.

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Read more from this story HERE.

Obama: MLK Would Have Backed ‘Obamacare’ (+video)

/14 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: Official White House Photo by Pete Souza

Photo Credit: Official White House Photo by Pete Souza

Would Martin Luther King Jr. support “Obamacare?” The president believes so.

Appearing on the Tom Joyner Morning Show Tuesday, President Barack Obama says the iconic civil rights leader would have backed the Affordable Care Act.

“Oh, he would like that … because I think he understood that health care, health security is not a privilege; it’s something that in a country as wealthy as ours, everybody should have access to,” Obama explained.

Obama says the key to the Affordable Care Act is “going to be just signing folks up.”

“We’re really counting on everybody out there to get informed,” Obama said. “If you know what it’s about and you screen out all the misinformation, you’ll discover this is something that really is going to help millions of people.”


Video Credit: Charlie Spiering, The Examiner

Read more from this story HERE.

Agents Shocked as Cartel Boss Involved in Torture Death of DEA Colleague Slips Away

/0 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit; Reuters

Photo Credit; Reuters

Mexican and U.S. authorities are scrambling to find a 60-year-old former drug lord — who was behind the brutal killing of an American agent nearly two decades ago — following his recent, and unexpected, release from a Mexican prison.

Rafael Caro Quintero walked out of Jalisco State prison shortly after midnight on Aug. 9 — a free man on a legal technicality, a decision which drew international condemnation and which the White House warns could lead to the release of other drug criminals in Mexico.

Security guards were assigned to follow Quintero after his release, but the former cartel boss was able to shake them after only 10 minutes, a source familiar with the events told FoxNews.com.

As both governments now try to figure out a way to re-apprehend and detain Quintero, outrage continues to build in the U.S., with current and former federal drug agents vowing to seek justice. The turn of events already threatens to deeply damage ties between the U.S. and Mexico. Attorney General Eric Holder has contacted his Mexican counterparts about the release, the Justice Department confirmed to FoxNews.com this week.

The case of Quintero, for U.S. agents, is personal. Quintero spent the last 28 years locked up for the 1985 kidnapping and killing of American DEA agent Enrique “Kiki” Camarena. He was originally sentenced to spend 40 years behind bars.

Read more from this story HERE.

Napolitano Warns Large-Scale Cyberattack on US is Inevitable (+video)

/1 Comment/in , /by

janet5 (1)Outgoing Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano warned her successor on Tuesday to move quickly to prepare for an inevitable large-scale cyberattack against the United States.

Napolitano, delivering her farewell address at the National Press Club, said her successor should move fast to strengthen the nation’s cyber defenses.

“Our country will, at some point, face a major cyber event that will have a serious effect on our lives, our economy and the everyday functioning of our society,” said Napolitano.

“While we have built systems, protections and a framework to identify attacks and intrusions, share information with the private sector and across government, and develop plans and capabilities to mitigate the damage, more must be done, and quickly.”

Napolitano said that while the terrorist threat to the country has not been eliminated, the ability for the U.S. to thwart attacks rapidly increases with each uncovered plot.

Read more from this story HERE.

NYT, Twitter and HuffPo Attacked by Syrian Electronic Army

/0 Comments/in , /by

By Danny Yadron, Shira Ovide and William Launder.

A pro-Syrian government group appeared to attack more than 10 websites, including Twitter, the New York TimesNYT -2.93% and HuffingtonPost.com, said security researchers citing digital evidence.

The attacks by the Syrian Electronic Army, a group of hackers that supports Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, come as the U.S. is considering action against Syria. In the past, the group has taken action against media organizations and websites it believes are sympathetic to Syrian rebels.

The websites, including the Huffington Post’s U.K. website, appeared to be compromised Tuesday by the group, said a security researcher who had seen digital evidence. HuffingtonPost confirmed the attack and said there was a “minimal disruption of service.”

The hackers, meantime, repeatedly claimed they had taken over Twitter’s Internet address, though they appeared to be unsuccessful.

The social media site never appeared to lose service. (The hackers used their own Twitter account to claim they had hacked the social-media website.)

Read more from this story HERE.

__________________________________________________________

Photo Credit: Adam Jeffery

Photo Credit: Adam Jeffery

New York Times website likely taken down by malicious attack

By Eamon Javers and Cadie Thompson.

The New York Times said its website has been taken down, in what was likely an external malicious attack Tuesday.

Eileen Murphy, VP of corporate communications, initially reported the outage via Twitter.

While the Times was down, Twitter also experienced some hiccups on its website. A Twitter account for the group of hackers called the Syrian Electronic Army claimed that it had attacked the social media website and changed the ownership listing of Twitter’s domain name registration.The same account later posted to Twitter that it had also taken over the registrations for the Times website and for the Huffington Post UK domain.

Twitter told CNBC that it was investigating the issue.

Twitter later issued a status update saying that its Domain Name System (DNS) provider had “experienced an issue in which it appears DNS records for various organizations were modified, including one of Twitter’s domains used for image serving, twimg.com.” As a result, “Viewing of images and photos was sporadically impacted.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Speaking Truth to Power About Obama

/7 Comments/in , /by

Barack ObamaIt’s getting so that you have to be a true believer in the mainstream media not to notice that Barack Obama’s presidency is floundering. His signature legislative accomplishment Obamacare is a disaster and his foreign policy has belly-flopped. And now, we may be at the brink of highly unpopular military engagement in Syria with no prospect of an outcome that would be beneficial to the United States.

It’s so bad that important writers on our side are not mincing so many words anymore. As the first black president, Obama enjoyed a halo in the media that lasted for most of his first term. When tea parties sprang up in opposition to his policies, the media establishment immediately labeled them racist, in effect enforcing a taboo on criticism of the first black president.

But Obama’s race-driven immunity is wearing off, and respected and knowledgeable writers are being frank about what a historic disaster Obama has been as president. The low information voters remain blissfully ignorant, of course, lulled into believing Obama is competent and his critics racist.

Michael Barone, who is widely respected beyond conservative circles compiles a breathtaking list of Obama’s historic incompetence on IBD:

Evidence of the astonishing incompetence of the Obama administration continues to roll in…

Read more from this story HERE.